The Adventures of Professor X
by transistor.robot
Summary: "I'm the Professor. Note the definite article." He was crazy. The man was actually, legitimately, completely, off his head. And he blew up her lab.
1. Chapter One, Part One

Hello there!

A bit of background info on the story. I'm a second generation Doctor Who viewer who grew up on VHS copies of the old series. Ever since I was a tiny little thing, I loved the Seventh Doctor story Remembrance of the Daleks. Ace is awesome. At one point during the serial, there's a television switched on in someone's sitting room. In a nod to the audience, the television is introducing 'a brand new science-fiction story'. The book series took that and ran, creating a 'parallel' Doctor Who series that existed as a fictional entity inside the Doctor Who universe. It was called 'Professor X'. This is based on that idea.

The Adventures of Professor X originally came from me wondering how different the series would be it were a Canadian or American production. How different would it be from Doctor Who? I know most people would automatically assume it would be no better than a Michael Bay film, but hey. Star Trek. The X-Files. Firefly. There is a precedent. What all those American sci-fi series have in common, that Doctor Who also has (but not in quite the same way), are the themes of restless wandering, never-ending quests, and the hero as the underdog. I hope I can emphasize that here, while maintaining the self-aware camp and sense of childlike wonder that made us all love Doctor Who in the first place.

Take a moment. Sit back. Grab a banana, and while you're at it, grab another one because you probably need the potassium* and enjoy

THE ADVENTURES OF PROFESSOR X

Chapter One, Part One: In Which Several People are in Particularly Bad Moods

* * *

In a wholly unremarkable solar system, on a wholly unremarkable planet, hugging the edge of one wholly unremarkable landmass, sat a university.

On the far edge of the campus, past the main cluster of buildings, sat the small laboratory that housed most of the university's biomedical science department. Inside that small laboratory, young Megan Dewey, biochemistry grad student, was cleaning a dirty Erlenmeyer flask. The word 'dirty', of course, was highly subjective. The casual viewer would hardly have considered the flask dirty, but after years of lectures on proper laboratory techniques, Megan knew that the flask could hardly hold water without contaminating it, much less her precious salamander DNA samples.

As she sat idly over a Bunsen burner, burning microscopic organisms off the rim of an Erlenmeyer flask, Megan was consumed with an oddly maternal love for her salamander DNA samples. She had obtained them at great personal expense, and stored them in a tiny disused corner of the main research lab, safe where no one would think of bothering either them or her. No one else was due to come in for the next few hours. She was alone, and her salamander DNA samples were safe. It was lovely.

After cleaning the flask, Megan reached to switch off the gas and nearly caught her hair on fire. Her bizarrely misplaced surge of maternal instincts had led to distraction, which had nearly led to singed hair, which had led to the warm fuzzies in her chest being replaced with burning embarrassment. With a frustrated grunt, she flicked her hair behind her ears and reached for her coffee in the vain hope that it might either give her the caffeine to focus, or at least calm her down enough to keep her from actually messing anything up. It was empty. She tapped the bottom. It was still empty.

"Lovely." she said.

With nothing better to waste time on, Megan Dewey decided to keep on keeping on with the salamander DNA. Sighing, she got up from her stool and went to see if she could find the gel electrophoresis apparatus she was using yesterday.

* * *

After far too long, the polyacrylamide gel had solidified into the right consistency to run the electrophoresis. Megan grabbed her plastic micropipet and her DNA samples, and began preparing the gel with far too much gusto for so early in the morning. Then someone burst in.

"Hey, have you seen anyone today?" She said, somewhat breathily.

The intruder was in her mid-thirties, of Asian extraction, and was far too put-together to belong in a lab. Megan quickly sized her up. Too old to be an undergrad, and she'd recognize her skirt and blazer combo if she made a habit of hanging around the lab.

"What're you doing here?" Megan asked.

"Have you seen anyone?" The woman seemed rather impatient. Oh well.

"Does it matter?" That was when Megan realized she had dropped the micropipet. This was a mild conundrum, as she had no spares. She briefly thought of cleaning the plastic micropipet with the Bunsen burner, then realized how ridiculous a solution that was.

"Come on. Seriously. Have you seen anyone?" The woman was visibly shaking with impatience. On a brighter note, Megan noticed that she had managed to catch her breath.

Megan paused before answering. It was a tense pause, but only because she intended it to be that way. A random woman may have broken into her lab, demanding answers to stupid questions like the fate of the world rested on them, but Megan was still in charge. "No. No, I haven't. Why?"

The woman sighed in relief as soon as Megan said the word 'no'. "Can I speak to you for a minute? Outside?"

Megan thought her face did a spectacular job of answering the question all by itself, but the woman wasn't taking no for an answer.

"You're in danger." The woman said, and when it became clear Megan wasn't taking her seriously, she muttered, "Everywhere I go, always. Somebody tells them they're in danger, they never believe it. Now come _on_."

"What kind of danger?" For some reason, the long-suffering tone in the woman's voice went a long way in Megan's mind to making her less of an annoying intruder and more of a person she might actually listen to. Of course she didn't _believe_ her.

"Dangerous danger." The woman replied, with more than a trace of frustration, and she bounded over, grabbed Megan by the arm, and tried to forcibly drag Megan out of the lab. Megan shrieked and put up a fight, but the woman was much stronger than her. Which really wasn't saying much.

The woman pulled Megan down the hall and to the fire exit, where she stopped and looked around, as though waiting for something. Megan managed to wrestle her arm free and glared up at the woman.

"What the f-"

"Shh!" The woman cut her off. "They might hear you."

"Who?" Just as Megan decided this woman was insane, a janitor came out of one of the labs. He stopped in the center of the hallway, looked around briefly, and walked off. His movements as he walked were oddly jerky, as if he had a bum knee. He probably had a bum knee.

The woman hissed in her ear. "You see that?"

"You're hiding from the janitors?"

"That's not a janitor." The woman whispered, looking at Megan with an expression that clearly showed how stupid she thought Megan was.

"Looks like a janitor to me."

"Well it _isn't._"

There was another awkward pause, after which Megan raised an eyebrow. She'd had enough of this; there were micropipets to clean. "Well, this is lovely, but I've got to-"

"No!" The woman said, alarm evident on her face. "You can't stay in there. Just wait until the professor gets here. He knows what's going on here." And with that, the woman grabbed Megan's arm again. Megan twisted her arm, but settled for fixing the woman with a glare filled with all of the annoyance she could muster.

The woman simply held on tighter, and with a face-smackingly beatific smile, said, "My name's Kimberly. What's yours?"

Megan had no words. Luckily, she was saved from saying anything by the sudden arrival of a tall blond man in an ugly sweater-vest. He shot a quick grin at Kimberly, and spun around wildly on the spot, scanning the walls. He fixed on a clock above a nearby doorway, and said, "Oooh. 10:38. That's wrong. Either way. Kimberly?"

"Yeah, Professor?"

"Find anyone? Anyone still around?"

"Only one. She's right here." At that, the man noticed Megan. And stopped.

After a few seconds of staring, during which Megan tried again to wrench her arm free, the man managed to choke out, "What's your name?"

"Megan." At that, Kimberly looked up sharply at the man. His eyes widened.

"Megan what?"

"Megan Dewey." Kimberly then dropped Megan's arm. The man continued to stare at Megan, completely dumbfounded. Like any normal person, Megan found the scrutiny more than a little disconcerting, and opened her mouth to say so when the man managed to collect himself at just the right time to cut her off.

"What's your prob-"

"I'm the Professor." He said quickly.

Megan was briefly taken aback, but she composed herself and quickly reconsidered him. She could see it. Slightly flighty demeanor, a mildly audacious air of authority combined with frantic desperation, bad taste in clothing. He probably taught something in the humanities. Like English. Or History. Megan immediately pegged him as the naive young professor that thought it was great that so many of his female students came to his office hours, but had no idea _why_ they always were there.

"Of what? History?"

At that, the professor grinned at her, a large amused grin. "No, but I like that. I'm _the_ Professor. Note the definite article." He continued staring at Megan, the amused grin still on his face.

Kimberly shuffled her feet and asked loudly, thankfully breaking the Professor's reverie, "Have you done the thing yet?"

"Right, the thing," He said, turning to the clock. "Yup."

Kimberly nodded. "Ok, good. How long do we have?"

"Long enough." The Professor replied glibly. Suddenly a top hat was in his hand. He put it onto his head. "Now we go. We've got thirty seconds."

Megan stared at the top hat. The top hat stared back.

"_Thirty seconds?" _Kimberly screeched.

"Till what?" Thirty seconds did not sound good. Especially since Kimberly had bolted out the fire exit.

The Professor grabbed Megan's hand roughly, and pulled her along. In the middle of her confusion, Megan couldn't help reflecting that it was a pretty good thing that he grabbed her hand and not her arm. It was a bit more humane. If she _was_ going to be dragged out of her lab and restrained, the least they could do would be to keep from bruising her arm.

* * *

Fascinating Fact: The standard unit of measurement for radiation, known as a coulomb, is exactly equivalent to the amount of radiation given off by the potassium in a single banana?

(Fascinating Facts may or not be true.)

Check back some time in the near future(relative to publication date) for the next installment!

Oh, and review. That is, if you don't mind. Please.


	2. Chapter One, Part Two

Hello again! You, the lucky reader, will now discover the answers to several things that are relatively important, in this, the latest exciting installment of

THE ADVENTURES OF PROFESSOR X

Chapter One, Part Two: In Which Things Explode

* * *

When the Professor grabbed Megan Dewey's hand and dragged her out of the laboratory, she decided that this entire situation had officially lost any novelty it may or may have had. Megan had always prided herself on her unruffleability, a fact that said a lot more about her than she could ever realize, but this was simply _too_ much. She could feel her carefully maintained equilibrium splintering, cracking, and shattering somewhere in the vicinity of her gut. In that instant, the brilliant young biochemistry hotshot with the composure of a Tibetan monk was replaced with a brilliant young biochemistry hotshot with the self-composure of an eight year old who needed to go to the bathroom. On that note, she really needed to get back into the lab.

Then the lab exploded.

The Professor ducked behind a Dumpster (tm)*, pulling Megan down with him. The Dumpster (tm) wasn't nearly far away enough to avoid being hit by several bits of debris, which crashed against the front, making conversation impossible. That, of course, was not nearly enough to deter Megan.

"The lab! It exploded!" She stated, as if it wasn't obvious.

"I know, I'm sorry. It was the only thing I could do."

Megan found that there was absolutely nothing she was physically capable of doing at the moment save staring at the Professor in shock. He was crazy. The man was actually, legitimately, completely, off his head. And he blew up her lab.

For the next several tense seconds, Megan repaid the Professor for his earlier ocular indiscretion with a glare that would make the most hardened criminal take holy orders, while the Professor tried to avoid her gaze, and flinched as a brick hit the side of the Dumpster (tm).

When she realized that she could move her mouth, she began saying all the thoughts in her head simultaneously. That didn't work. She narrowed it down to the one thought rattling around the most in her brain, a thought which said a lot more about her than she ever could realize.

"_You_ did that? There were people in there!" Her mind briefly flicked to the janitor with the bum knee, the one that woman Kimberly hadn't considered a janitor.

"No, there weren't. We got you out. You were the only one left."

Oh god, no. "No! No, there was someone else in there!"

If Megan had thought the Professor's attention was on her earlier, she had been sorely mistaken. This was what it looked like.

"Were they moving strangely? Like this?" Then he lifted his arms from the ground and jerked them up and down, like he was dancing the robot.

"What? No!" Well, he did have the bum knee. "He had a bum knee."

The Professor's demeanor changed instantly. The intensity drained from his body, and he gave Megan a small smile. In a vain attempt to seem reassuring, he told her, "It's all right. He wasn't a person. He didn't actually die."

There were so many things wrong with that statement.

Evidently the Professor didn't think so, because his attention had shifted to the surrounding area, scanning the nearby smoking rubble. "Did you see where Kimberly went?"

"PROFESSOR!"

"Ah, there we go." He then grabbed Megan's hand and pulled her up. "Can't stay around here, Meggy-girl. Up we go."

"Meggy-girl?" She made a point of digging her nails into the crazy Professor's crazy hands as he dragged her across the field behind the smoking remains of the lab, towards the forest.

Towards the forest. Every single bit of mass media Megan had ever consumed told her that this was a Very Bad Thing. She dug her heels into the ground, prepared to scratch, kick, or whatever necessary to ensure that the Professor _did not take her into the forest and murder her._ To her surprise, he stopped and let go of her hand.

"What?" This was obviously not something he had been expecting, and now that it had happened, he wasn't pleased.

Megan replied with a well-thought out and eloquent rebuttal. She stood still, heels of her sneaker dug deep into the ground, and crossed her arms. The Professor replied with a look that was specifically designed to tell Megan in no uncertain terms that he, too, was fluent in the ancient art of body language.

"You blew up my lab. And there were people in it." There. That'll do it. What could he possibly say to that? Megan felt empowered, mainly because her lab coat was flapping in the breeze behind her.

He sighed. "They weren't people, you were the only one left. Now can you get up?"

"And now you want me to go into the forest?"

"Fine." The Professor said, facing her."What's the deal?" He asked, and to his credit, he managed to keep most of the frustration out of his voice.

"You blew up my lab."

"Yes. I had to. The lab had been overrun." The unspoken addendum '_now _are you happy?' hung between his brain and his mouth. With any luck, he could manage to keep it in.

"_Now_ are you happy?" Oh. Guess not.

"You son of a-"

"Language, Megan Dewey!"

Megan squeaked in anger.

The Professor took the opportunity to quickly collect himself, something he didn't often have cause to do.

"What the-? No! Move!" Kimberly had managed to find them, which was a relatively simple task, considering they were standing in a rather large field.

"She's not going in the forest. She thinks I'm going to kill her." The Professor said, testing out his newly-found calm.

Kimberly briefly considered that. "Hmm, I can see that."

"He blew up my lab."

"Would it make you feel any better if I promised that he's not going to kill you?" Kimberly said, addressing Megan.

"No." Duh.

"Ok, then." She then grabbed Megan's arm roughly and began dragging her towards the forest. Megan had long since tired of being dragged from place to place. She let out a shriek of protest, which Kimberly ignored.

"I'm going to save your life whether you want me to or not."

As they walked briskly to the forest, Kimberly looked over at the Professor. "Oh, and Professor?"

"Yes, Kimberly?"

"That was _not_ thirty seconds."

"Yes, it was. I counted."

"No, it wasn't."

"I'm a Time Lord, I know how long thirty seconds takes." The Professor replied primly.

"Obviously not."

Megan had finally had enough. "_Time Lord?_ You have to be kidding me. You people are kidding me."

* * *

We have learned several fascinating things, my ducklings. Firstly, we have learned that Kimberly does not suffer fools gladly(or at all). Secondly, we have learned that the Professor is a Time Lord. Thirdly, we have learned that Megan knows what a Time Lord is. What could _possibly_ be going on?

Yes, I know it's fairly obvious, but I can assure you that it's _far_ more interesting than that.

Hold on, my ducklings, and you shall see.

Fascinating Fact: Dumpster (tm) is a trademark, not a term. I know, right? I put the (tm) in because I think those sort of things are funny.

How's it going? How's the Professor? Approximately how annoying do you find Megan?


	3. Chapter One, Part Three

Hello back, my ducklings! How are you? Good? Good. Ready? Lovely. Sit back, relax, and prepare yourself for

THE ADVENTURES OF PROFESSOR X

Chapter One, Part Three: In Which Television Shows are Briefly Discussed

* * *

"Time Lord?" Megan Dewey scoffed as she was dragged through a small field by a well-dressed Asian woman, whose name, by the way, was Kimberly Kaminaga. "You people are insane. You're like crazy arsonist Doctor Who fans who think the show's real! You're going to end up on the news or something. The headlines'll be like "SCI-FI FANS GO NUTS ON SCIENCE LAB, HUNDREDS DEAD"! And they'll think I'm part of it, cause I'm quiet. Everyone knows it's the quiet smart ones who snap and burn things down!"

The Professor snorted at the word 'quiet'.

"I was annoyed, but now I'm actually pissed off. For the love of god, let me GO!" Megan shouted, working herself up into a fervor of righteous indignation. Her attention shifted to the Professor. "And _you_! You...you...domestic terrorist! What's your real name? I bet you've got two first names, like all the other crazy murder people!" She narrowly avoided tripping over a rock as they entered the forest, and was momentarily silent.

The Professor dashed ahead of them with an oddly deer-like grace, stopping and posing on a large rock. His top hat was inexplicably still on his head. Megan noticed that immediately, but decided to deal with it later. There was a weird thing in the woods. The Professor was gesturing grandly in the direction of the weird thing with a brilliantly shiny smile. He obviously expected Megan to say something.

"It looks like a giant soda can." And it did. It looked exactly like a soda can, if the labels had been peeled off, complete with tapering edges. Megan couldn't see if the top had the little tab, but other than that, it looked exactly like a soda can. The main difference was that it was approximately seven feet high and three feet around.

"It's my TARDIS!" The Professor exclaimed, looking for all the world like an excited little boy.

Megan sighed. "It's wonderful."

He either ignored the sarcasm or simply didn't catch it. "Isn't it? It's so _sleek_!"

"Police box just not doing it for you?" Megan muttered

"Don't you recognize it?" Kimberly asked.

"No, she wouldn't." The Professor replied.

"Wait, but-"

"That's a different person. Sort of. They're kind of the same person. Ish." Kimberly gave him a look. "I told you she was from a parallel universe."

"Oh, so you knew _that_ Megan? And this is the _other_ Megan?"

"More or less."

Megan broke up their short conversation. "Well, other Megan is mildly offended."

The Professor stopped and slowly turned toward her.

Kimberly gave her a small, sympathetic grin. She understood what Megan was going through much better than the Professor. She did feel for the girl, but that didn't mean she was going to take her garbage. Megan took that, along with the Professor's slow predatory turn, as a sign that the Professor was _definitely _going to kill her now. Maybe she should have been nicer about the soda can.

She was completely floored when the Professor smiled at her and held out his hand. "By the way, what did you mean about police boxes?"

"Police boxes? Like in Doctor Who." The Professor looked at her blankly. "You know, the T.V. show? Time Lords, time travel?" Still nothing. "_You're _the one who thinks he's a Time Lord."

"I have no idea what you're talking about. What is she talking about, Kimberly?"

"Beats me."

"Come on. It's a British television show. A British guy travels around the universe and saves the day, yadda yadda. He changes his face sometimes? He's always got a girl with him? Nothing? Really?"

"Nope." Kimberly looked at her. "I don't really like science-fiction."

"I wonder who it was. How many British people have I traveled with?" He started counting off on his hand. "No, couldn't have been her. She's on Zavirox 7. And he's from 2130. Maybe it was-"

"I can't believe you've never heard of Doctor Who. _Someone_ must have mentioned it to you at _some _point."

"No, it's never come up."

"That's just weird."

The Professor started to protest, then quickly changed tactics. "Never mind that. Megan Dewey, this is my TARDIS. TARDIS, this is Megan Dewey. Again. Nothing like a second first introduction, don't you think? Except for the first introduction. Obviously."

Megan stared at what was supposed to be a TARDIS in complete shock, while the Professor smiled benevolently at her, hand still outstretched.

"Why's it a soda can?"

Kimberly, standing several feet off, piped up, saying, "Yeah, that's what I asked him. Of course I called it a pop can, like normal people."

There was no response that wouldn't spoil the burgeoning moment, so the Professor ignored Kimberly and said to Megan, "It's actually a portable street cleaner from Ollelosh. These things are all over the galaxy. They put them on street corners, and civil service workers store their equipment in them. Like a supply closet. Cool, huh? They don't have 'em on Earth, but generally I can just park her anywhere and people think she's modern art. Or something like that."

He walked over to the TARDIS and patted the side affectionately. "Want a ride?"

For a second, Megan was tempted to accept his offer. But then she shook herself. Her mother had always told her that she was far too much of a dreamer for her own good, and that one day someone was going to take advantage of that. He just blew up her lab. She opened her mouth to reply and Kimberly cut her off.

"Professor." Kimberly's voice was oddly still.

"What?" The smile dropped from the Professor's face, though he kept his eyes firmly focused on Megan. His eyes were really green.

"They've found us."

* * *

Ooh. That's tense, isn't it? I don't know about you, but I'm definitely feeling the tension.

Now, I don't want to be one of those annoying people who begs for reviews, but I'd love to know what someone thinks of this. Good? Bad? Meh? I'm going to keep on no matter what; so don't worry if you're following this. I won't abandon this in a huff. I'd just like to know if someone likes this. :)

In the next installment: The cliffhanger is resolved and possibly followed with another one! Will there be another cliffhanger? You'll have to wait for the next installment of

THE ADVENTURES OF PROFESSOR X


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